Too Young
by Wendla-Darling-Dreamer
Summary: Gordie has been feeling like the invisible boy for far too long-but just before the trip to see the dead body, he meets a girl who just may change all that. Rated T simply for complications in romance that younger readers might not comprehend.
1. Prologue

**I do not own Stand by Me or any of its characters or affiliates, and I also do not own Nat King Cole or any of his songs, because his song is used as the title of this story and throughout the story at later times.**

Prologue

Sometimes, in the middle of a complicated but overall normal life, life throws something at you that is really extraordinary. This extraordinary blessing in my life came in the form of a girl named Riley, and when I first met her, I knew she wasn't like any other girl I'd met.

She changed my outlook on life. Ever since Denny's death, I'd felt almost worthless, especially around my house, but once I met Riley, I knew that something was out there for me. There was something meant for me. I was my own person, I was no longer in Denny's shadow. I had my own life with my own relationships and my own feelings and my own likes and dislikes, and Riley showed me that and so much more.

So this story, in short, is a story of my first love. My true love. As many complications as we might have gone through, Riley will always be the only one for me. She's my girl, my love, my best friend, my partner, my guide-always has been and always will be.

This isn't only the summer that I saw my first dead body-this was the summer that I began to learn what it truly meant to love someone.

**Well, I know it was short, but remember, it's just a prologue. Please review, because, since this is my first fanfiction, I really want to see what you think of me!**


	2. Chapter One: At First Glance

**I do not own Stand by Me or any of its characters or Nat King Cole or any of his songs!**

Chapter One

At First Glance

The first day I saw Riley was the day Chris, Teddy, and I left on our expedition to find Ray Brower's body.

I was walking home from the tree house, and I was halfway there when I heard a rustle in the bushes around me. I paused for a moment, listening, and heard nothing, so I continued on. A couple of feet later, I heard a twig snap, and I whipped around, scanning the bushes for the culprit. Through a few bare branches in one of the bushes, I could see a bit of purple material.

Slowly, I walked to the bush and looked down at a girl crouched on the ground, who was looking at the dirt as if searching for something.

"Hey there," I said casually.

The girl fell backwards and landed on her rear end at the sound of my voice, her legs out in front of her, hands at her sides, and peered up at me.

She was pretty in a plain sort of way, I guess. Her hair was brown with faint golden highlights, and it waved gently to nearly the middle of her back. She had big blue eyes framed with long lashes, a small nose, full pink lips, very pale skin, and rosy cheeks. She was wearing a purple t-shirt with darker purple shorts and brown sandals.

"Are you alright?" I inquired.

"I am _now_," she replied, hastily returning to her earlier position of kneeling on the ground, still searching. "You nearly scared me to death."

"I'm sorry," I apologized, and glanced downward.

She became motionless for a few seconds, and then stood up and looked me square in the face.

"Who are you?" she asked curiously.

"Gordie Lachance," I answered immediately, without even thinking of the reason why I was telling this girl my name.

"Gordie?" she repeated. "What kind of a name is that?"

"Short for Gordon," I explained.

"Oh," she said bashfully, looking at her feet.

"Who are you?" I spat out.

Her head shot back up, and she smiled. "Riley Parker."

I nodded. _Riley. _ That was a pretty name for a girl.

"How old are you?" she asked.

"Twelve."

"Really? Me too."

I paused for a moment before saying, "What were you doing in the bushes?"

"Oh," she said, seeming embarrassed. "My family just moved here, and I was walking around, exploring, and I dropped the pennies my mother gave me to buy something." She shrugged. "Can't find them anywhere."

"I could help you look for a bit," I suggested. Again, I didn't know why I was doing this. If any other random girl had even asked me to help her look, I would've teased them about it and said no. But this girl hadn't even asked me, and I was offering my help to her.

The two of us kneeled down and began to look through the dirt for the lost pennies. I felt embarrassingly like Vern.

"So," the girl began after a few moments, "where were you headed before I stopped you?"

Normally, I wouldn't be telling anyone other than my friends any of this information, but this girl was different, somehow. So I told her.

"Three of my friends and me are going to see a dead body."

"Really?" she said, her eyes flying wide open suddenly. "Whose?"

"Uh…Ray Brower's. You probably haven't heard of him."

"Oh, I've been here long enough to know about that. That's that kid who went picking blueberries and never came back, right?"

"Uh-huh," I said.

"Are you serious? You know where his body is?"

"Yeah, but you can't tell anyone."

"I won't," she said. "Do you think he got hit by a train, like everyone's saying?"

"Probably."

"Wow," she said, and lowered her eyes to the ground. Then she looked up again and meekly asked, "Could I come?"

If it were anyone else, I would have told them "no" immediately, but somehow I couldn't bring myself to say that to this particular girl. How strange...

"Um…"I began, "well…you see, it's kind of just a little private trip, me and Chris and Teddy and Vern."

"Oh, okay," she said. "I understand."

It surprised me for some reason that she was so accepting of this. "You do?"

She nodded fervently. "Of course. Why would I want to intrude on your time with your friends? It was rude of me to ask."

This girl took me by surprise. "No, it wasn't."

We sat in silence for a bit, and then I found myself saying, "As soon as I get back, I'll look for you."

She turned her head sideways to look at me and smiled. "'Kay."

I smiled too. "'Kay."

At surprising times throughout our trip to see the Brower kid's body, I found myself thinking of this new girl, Riley. What surprised me even more than the fact that I was thinking about her was how often I was thinking about her. She must have crossed my mind a hundred times on our trip.

I got to wondering the strangest little things about her. What did she like to do in her spare time? Was she scared of leeches (for obvious reasons)? What was her favorite food? Did she have any siblings?

Did she have a boyfriend?

I shook that last question away repeatedly. What did I want to do with girls, anyway? Girls were annoying and obnoxious things who giggled too much and hung on your every word like desperate creatures.

Or were they?

I didn't know what to think anymore. This girl had changed everything, had flipped everything upside down for me.

What was I going to do about her?

**Well? What do you think so far now that you've had a better look at it? Please review, and I would like to tell you that I will probably be updating one chapter each week unless I have computer trouble or I am just too busy!**


	3. Chapter Two: Blue Skies

**Hey, guys! Thanks for the good reviews! I've got some good news, too. Last weekend, I participate in the Power of the Pen (a writing competition) regional tournament, and I received first place individually, a best of round for round three (there's three rounds overall), and the Dennis Grey Memorial Award! I'm going to state for the second time! **

**Now to continue with **_**this **_**story! I do not own Stand By Me or any of its characters or Nat King Cole or any of his songs!**

Chapter Two

Blue Skies

After we four had returned to Castle Rock and I'd said my goodbyes to Teddy and Vern, I stood up by our tree house with Chris, looking out over the town. Even with the discoveries we'd made and the drastic changes that had occurred in our friendships during the trip, only one person filled my mind.

I couldn't wait to see her again; but I didn't know where to start looking. I realized that I had no idea where she lived. Oh well-in a town with 1,281 people, it couldn't take too long to find her.

"I'm never gonna get out of this town, am I, Gordie?" Chris wondered aloud.

Reluctantly, I pulled out of my thoughts about her and told him, "You can do anything you want, man."

"Yeah. Sure," Chris said disbelievingly.

I gave him a look to show that I meant what I said.

After a few seconds, Chris said, "Gimme some skin."

I complied, and then said, "I'll see ya."

"Not if I see you first," Chris said, turning away.

I smiled and watched him walk away. At one point, he turned back and raised his hand in farewell, and I did the same. Then he was gone, and I turned back to look out at Castle Rock once more.

Where could she be?

Turns out I didn't have to look for her after all. After several minutes of just standing there beside the tree house, wondering where to begin my search, I noticed a small figure begin its trek up the side of the hill, and instantly knew it was her.

I broke into a grin in relief and waved at her. She shielded her eyes from the sun with one hand and raised the other hand to wave back at me.

She had her hair pulled up into a ponytail today, and she was wearing all blue instead of purple. I found it peculiar how I'd only seen her twice, and yet I was already rapidly thinking her more and more beautiful.

I walked down the hill, and we met each other halfway.

"Hey," she said, and I marveled at how the sound of her voice calmed me.

"Hey," I replied lamely.

We began to walk beside each other, and I tried to match her, footstep for footstep. It was a beautiful summer day, with a pristine blue sky, and it wasn't quite as hot as it had been the last couple of days; it was just the right temperature. But I barely noticed these things because of the girl walking next to me.

"How was your trip?" she asked.

I thought of a way to put it in one word. "Interesting."

"Why is that?" she asked, turning her head to look at my face.

"It's a little complicated to explain," I said. Plus I didn't want to admit to her that I'd cried alongside my guy friends. She'd probably think I was a wuss.

She came to an abrupt stop. "Are you all right?"

Oh no. She'd noticed something.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Why?" I pretended to be oblivious.

She shook her head. "Nothing…I just thought you…never mind."

I made a mental note: She wasn't one to hover over subjects that I didn't want to discuss.

"So," she began after a while of silence, "did you see the body?"

"Yeah, uh…we did," I admitted.

"How was it?" she asked, and then she hurriedly added, "You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to."

"No, it's okay," I said. "He, um…definitely got hit by a train."

"Oh. That bad, huh?"

"Well, not as bad as I thought it'd be," I told her truthfully. "He was a little bloodied up, but nothing I couldn't handle." There you go, Gordie. Make yourself sound tougher than you really were.

"Hmm," she acknowledged. Then she looked up at the sky, as if noticing it for the first time. "It's a really pretty day, don't you think?"

"Yeah," I agreed. _But not as pretty as you are_, I wanted to say, but I stopped myself. What was I doing? I'd only known Riley for two days. I couldn't be transforming into a romantic after that amount of time, especially since I'd barely noticed girls before Riley came along. I'd even noticed the last couple of days, though, that my conversations with my friends were starting to seem insignificant compared to her.

"Race you to the five-and-dime," Riley challenged me.

I smiled at her, and she smiled back and raised her eyebrows, waiting. "You're on," I said.

We both took off sprinting, clouds of dust flying behind us, and to tell the truth, I'd never felt so free in my life.

**Yes, that was a short chapter, but it's kind of a…transition chapter, I guess. This was a very early posting, and I'm just warning you: Don't be expecting an early posting every week! I actually should be working on schoolwork and cleaning my room, but that all just seems so dull, wouldn't you agree? I will probably post on Sundays and Mondays from now on. I'll let you know if my schedule changes. Please review!**


	4. Chapter Three: A Labor Day to Remember

**I'm so sorry for taking over a week to post, but, not to sound like I'm making excuses, we have testing at school all this week, and our teachers have been laying the homework on thick.**

**So I have some very cool, very strange, and slightly eerie news. I was researching Wil Wheaton, who, in case you didn't know, played Gordie in ****Stand by Me****. I thought maybe by doing research on him, since he was so like his character, I could capture his personality and feelings a little more accurately. While researching, I came across something a bit unsettling.**

**Wil Wheaton owns a dog…named Riley. **

**Yes, I suppose that doesn't seem so shocking, but I swear I knew nothing about this. I actually came up with the name Riley just by going down my list of favorite girls' names. Oh, and also, he likes Coldplay. So I officially love him. (I'm a little obsessed with Coldplay…they're sort of my favorite band.)**

**I know what you're all thinking. **_**Shut up and get on with the story! **_**So here you are, you demanding people. Here's chapter three of ****Too Young****. I do not own ****Stand by Me**** or any of its characters or Nat King Cole or any of his songs.**

Chapter Three

A Labor Day to Remember

The next day, Labor Day, Riley showed me where she lived. I was excited to find out that she only lived a couple streets away from me, but in a town as little as this one, she couldn't have lived much farther out, could she?

She lived in a very quaint two-story house, painted white, with three steps leading up to the front door, two windows on either side, and three windows on the floor above.

Before I entered her house, I paused. I'd never been to a girl's house before. "Are you sure this is okay with your parents?" I asked.

"Sure! Why wouldn't it be?" she replied, tugging me into the house. She navigated me through the hallways until we reached the kitchen in the back of the house. Her mother was standing at the counter, writing something down. She looked up as we came in.

"Hi there, kids," she greeted us.

"Mom," Riley said, gesturing to me, "this is Gordie LaChance."

Boy, I loved it when she said my name.

I raised my hand slightly and mouthed a silent "hi", and her mother gave me a huge grin.

"Well, hello, Gordie," she said. "LaChance, did you say?" she asked Riley.

Riley nodded fervently.

"Hmm, I think I spoke with your mother when we were moving in here. Charming woman," Riley's mother said.

This surprised me. My mother didn't talk to many people much anymore. She must have put on a smiling face to welcome the new family to the neighborhood.

"Thank you, ma'am," I said, nodding.

"Just call me Mrs. Parker," she instructed.

"Mrs. Parker," I corrected myself.

"You're always welcome here," Mrs. Parker said.

"Thank you, Mrs. Parker. Are you sure? I don't want to be any trouble." I was on my best behavior, being as polite as I possibly could. This _was _Riley's mother. I wanted to make a good impression on her parents.

"Oh, nonsense," Mrs. Parker said, waving a hand dismissively. "You're of no inconvenience, dear."

"Thank you," I said gratefully. She didn't know how grateful I was to her for letting me spend time with her daughter.

Mrs. Parker gave me a small smile and walked out of the room, her heels clacking on the linoleum.

"So," Riley began, turning to face me, "are you hungry?"

"Uh…yeah, I guess so," I said. Sheesh, I sounded so stupid when I was talking to her.

Riley giggled, and I decided saying stupid things around her wasn't so bad if I could hear her adorable laughter every time I did.

"Okay," she said, still laughing a little, "I'll see what we have."

She searched around her kitchen for a bit, and I watched her the entire time. Why did I find every little thing she did so fascinating?

"Hmm," she finally said, breaking the silence. "Let's see…we have popsicles…popsicles…and…more popsicles. What would you like?"

I pretended to deliberate. "Well, I'm gonna have to go with…popsicles."

She laughed, and I smiled.

While she grabbed us each a popsicle, I walked over to her sink and looked out the window above it. Sunlight poured in from the beautiful day outside, and I realized that I could see my house from the window above her kitchen sink. A very strange thrill went through me at the thought of that.

"Here you go," Riley said, handing me a red popsicle.

I took it, and then she led me through another hallway to the sitting room. I paused momentarily, because everything was white: the carpet, the couches and chairs, the curtains, everything. I didn't want to get anything on the furniture.

Riley took a seat on the loveseat, unwrapped her popsicle, and then looked up at me. When she noticed I was still standing in the doorway, she stood up, grabbed me by the wrist, and led me to the place beside her on the loveseat.

"But…but I…" I protested.

She dismissed my worries with a wave of her hand. "Don't worry about it."

After a while of sitting next to each other in silence, eating our popsicles, I cleared my throat and asked, "So, um…where's your dad?"

Riley looked away from me, playing absently with the curtain hung on the windows next to us, and said, "Um…he's, uh…back in the work shed. It's…behind the house."

I looked at her briefly, made suspicious by the way she had said that, but if she wasn't about to press matters that made me uncomfortable, then neither was I.

Instead, I just said, "Oh."

After finishing our popsicles in silence, we brushed our hands off on our pants and stood up. I turned to look at Riley, and something awe-inspiring occurred.

The long, white curtains of the window were parted to the side, allowing the sunlight to stream freely through. When I turned to face Riley, her face was framed by the sunlight, seeming to shine through her nearly translucent pale skin and illuminating her facial features, making her look more angelic than she already was. It took my breath away.

Suddenly, I had the overwhelming urge to kiss her.

I nearly did, too, but I fought it with all of my strength. I couldn't do that. It would be much too spontaneous, and I didn't want to scare her off.

Instead, I just stood and stared at her, probably looking very odd as I grappled with the emotions wrestling inside of me.

She tilted her head sideways, looking at me in confusion. I had to fight my emotions off with even more determination, because she looked even more adorable when she was bewildered.

"What is it?" she asked.

I blinked and shook my head, trying to clear my thoughts. "Nothing," I lied, rubbing my eyes. I had been staring in the direction of the window for too long without blinking.

She looked at me as if not sure what to think, then slowly nodded. "Okay," she said, smiling in an almost wry manner. "You wanna go see my room?"

I nodded. "Sure."

Her grin grew wider, then, and she took me by the hand, pulling me into the main hallway and up the stairs. I was running to keep up with her, and she was laughing her beautiful laugh.

"Not too loud on the stairs, now!" I could hear Mrs. Parker order.

"Sorry, Mom!" Riley yelled back.

When we reached the top of the stairs, we turned right and bolted into a bedroom just off the top of the stairwell, and then came to a halt, so out of breath that we were panting.

Her room was painted a light blue with dark blue trim, and she had a fluffy white comforter on her bed and lacy white curtains on her window.

Posters were hung on the walls all around her room. I recognized Fats Domino, The Penguins, Elvis, Buddy Holly, Frankie Lymon and the Teenagers, Bobby Day, and Big Bopper. I gestured to the posters. "You have good taste in music," I complimented her.

She smiled shyly. "Thanks."

I nodded and walked slowly around the room. I placed my hand on the comforter of her bed and looked around her room again.

She pointed to the bed. "You can sit down there."

"Thanks." I took a seat.

After a few seconds, Riley slid her shoes off and came to sit by me. I turned my head away from her and smiled to myself.

We spent the rest of the afternoon sitting on her bed, discussing our likes and dislikes, especially in music. After what felt like a few minutes, I looked at the small alarm clock on Riley's bedside table.

"Oh," I said, realizing it was already 6:00. How had five hours passed already? That was impossible. "I'd better be going."

Still, I remained on Riley's bed, staring at her. She was lying on her side with her elbow on her pillow, propping her head up, with her free arm clutching her knees to her chest.

She nodded absently. Apparently she'd been as absorbed in our conversation as I'd been.

Reluctantly, as slowly as I could manage, I stood up and walked toward her doorway. I could hear her quickly sit up behind me.

"Wait!" she called out.

I spun around, looking at her expectantly.

"So…um…I'll see you tomorrow?" she asked, fidgeting with the edge of her comforter and staring at the carpet.

"Sure," I said, breaking into a smile. Then I remembered we had school the next day. "Oh, but we have school," I groaned.

"Oh, yeah," she said in a disappointed tone. "Junior High."

I nodded. "Well, we could meet after school," I said, eager to cheer her up and see her smile.

She raised her eyes to mine and grinned. "Cool."

"So I'll see you then?" I asked.

"Yeah."

I turned and began to walk out again.

"Gordie?" she said from behind me.

I turned back around. "Yeah?"

"Could you…show me your tree house tomorrow?" she inquired, her blue eyes wide.

"Of course," I said.

"Really?"

"Absolutely." _Anything to make you happy, Riley._

"Okay," she said.

"Well…bye," I replied, waving.

"Bye," she said, raising her hand.

Then I turned around and walked out her bedroom door, down the stairs, and out the front door of Riley's house to begin the short journey home.

**Okay, so…what do you think? Is it realistic or not? Horrible or decent? How do you like the budding romance between the two? Review and let me know! **


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